NYT: With Sonic, G.M. Stands Automaking on Its Head

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/13/business/with-chevrolet-sonic-gm-and-uaw-reinvent-automaking.html?_r=3&ref=todayspaper


Fabrizio Costantini for The New York Times

The 2012 Chevrolet Sonic at the General Motors Orion Assembly Plant in Lake Orion, Mich. More Photos »

By BILL VLASIC
Published: July 12, 2011

ORION TOWNSHIP, Mich. — The only subcompact car being built on American soil will soon roll out of an assembly plant here in suburban Detroit that is as unusual as the car itself.

The production line has been squeezed into half the space of a traditional plant. Welding robots are concentrated in efficient clusters, instead of being spaced along the line, while many of the workers earn half the typical union wage. Even the first coat of rust-proofing has been reformulated so that it is one-hundredth as thick as — and thereby cheaper than — the coating on other cars.

One of the oldest axioms in the auto industry is that no company can build a subcompact car in the United States and make money because they are priced too low. The Ford Fiesta is built in Mexico. The Honda Fit is made in several places, including China and Brazil. But with Americans — and Detroit — rediscovering small cars because of high gasoline prices, General Motors is intent on shattering that notion with its new Chevrolet Sonic. The car, with a base price of around $14,000, will give G.M. a new entry in the lowest tier of the market when it goes on sale this fall. The Sonic is also expected to be a breakthrough in establishing a new level of cooperation between Detroit and the United Automobile Workers.

The radically revamped factory here operates with fewer and cheaper workers, many of whom are paid $14 an hour rather than the full U.A.W. wage of $28 an hour.

The plant itself is smaller and reconfigured to save money, with company executives modeling some of the changes after G.M.’s most efficient factories in Germany and Korea. The production line’s footprint alone was reduced from a million square feet to 500,000 — the equivalent of losing the space of more than two Wal-Mart Super Stores. The energy bill was cut by powering some operations with methane gas from neighboring landfills.

The Sonic will be G.M.’s littlest, and most fuel-efficient, conventionally powered vehicle. It was conceived in 2008 before the federal government’s bailout of the bankrupt automaker, when negotiators from the company and the union began brainstorming about what it would take to make a profitable subcompact car in the United States rather than in low-wage countries.

“We wanted to prove we could do it,” said Diana D. Tremblay, G.M.’s head of global manufacturing.

FULL story and photo slide show at link.

[asjr]

1. Sonic is a burger joint in my neck of the woods.

[littlewolf]

2. same here ... wondered what was going on ....

glad to see things are picking up some .... hopefully the market will be
liking this new car ....

[originalpckelly]

3. Yeah, that way we can all work for half of what we usually make.

This is the typical bullshit being done by unions these days. Instead of getting good wages for everyone, only the people with seniority are getting the normal old wages, while the newer recruits are permanently getting cheaper shitty wages.

"Fuck you, I've got mine..."
Seems to be the new way with these unions.

[socialist_n_TN]

6. Yep, that's what I was thinking too. Also

I wonder if the BOSSES, up to and including the division head, are making half wages.

[Omaha Steve]

7. The wage tiers were forced on the unions by the Obama bankruptcy

The UAW got part ownership in return. As the company makes money, so do the members.

Perhaps you forgot profit sharing checks were at record levels this year?

[TNLib]

8. That's what happened to me when I was a union worker

and if you want to get hired in at a higher wage even if management is open to it, they have to get a waiver from the union. So most managers will just say we'd like to pay you more but the union won't let us.

[Pithlet]

4. I thought of the hedgehog

It helps that I have a seven year old who loves that video game, I'm sure.

[surrealAmerican]

5. Not a good name for a car.

It looks okay, but calling it "sonic" just makes it seem unpleasantly noisy.

[rurallib]

9. We look to be buying a car in about 2 years.

I had hoped electric might be almost viable by then.
This may be an alternative, but I will be waiting on the reviews and a test drive.
The thin rust protection sounds scary.